ServiceDesk 4.5.6 Update 03/07/11

For those of you who attended Glade Ross's class at the ASTI convention, this is the feature Steve Merriam has been seeking for three long years (the one in connection with which he told the class: "Don't hold your breath!"). 

I do apologize, Steve (and likewise to everyone else who should have been enjoying the benefits of this kind of tool) that it's taken so long.  I have two excuses.  First, it really was a very large project.  Second, it truly needed as foundation the kind of improvements I've made, in underlying structure, during the past half year or so (see the many, many entries below regarding that series of improvements). 

This new interface can be accessed via the Main Menu (under the Parts Management heading), as follows:

Or, as you can see via the menu-item listing itself, the QuickKey shortcut is Ctrl-Shift/F8. 

The basic idea in this new interface is it gives you a single location to see all parts that need assembled for going out with a particular tech for a particular day's work, and to indicate by simple clicking action if in fact you're moving each such item from office to the tech.  It further provides a basis, within the same interface, to see what should be coming back from the tech, and to likewise indicate via single click if in fact such items came back. 

Here's what it looks like:

We believe that overall this brand new interface is a huge -- nea massive -- improvement over what SD systems prior afforded in regard to these particular processes.  In fact, we likely should increase the cost of our support in exchange for bringing such a huge improvement to you.  Nah.  Just kidding. 

Seriously, there's a real and serious reason why Steve Merriam has campaigned so assiduously for this feature.  He had the vision, way back, realizing what a value it could have.  And, now, his vision is realized.  Please be sure you take advantage of it. 

To use the new interface -- we think -- will be fairly self-explanatory.  There are a plethora of tooltips within it, if you just float your mousepointer over various objects (we urge you to do this, as you'll learn things as you do).  There are links and cross-links to virtually anything your heart might desire.  I'll shortly be adding a section in the manual describing more specifically how all the details work, but I'll bet most of you can figure it out regardless.  I'll place a new entry here indicating when the manual revision is ready.